Justicar
by bluekrishna
Summary: Written for Aeternix's 'ORIGINAL CHARACTERS' Feb Writing Contest at Aria's Afterlife Forum. The path of justice is never easy and almost always trod by those who have some great wrong to right. Astraea fights to fulfill the demands of her Code. Will those she encounters along the way help or hinder? Save or destroy her? Find out!
1. Chapter 1

Astraea looked upon the stricken face of the mother with pity. "Stand away. She must answer for her crimes."

"It was an accident! She's only a child!" Stubborn, the woman, Meleta, tucked her daughter behind her, putting herself between hunter and prey.

A perilous place to be. The justicar raised a brow and aimed her pistol a little higher, centering the sight over Meleta's heart. "A child who caused the death of six other children. A child who murders is no child at all."

The adolescent girl looked around her mother with terror twisting her round, flushed features. Astraea felt a twist at her heart to be looked at so. By this child and all who'd come out of doors to witness this judgement, as though Astraea was the monster here. An assessment that struck too close to the mark for comfort. But then again, Astraea had not picked this vocation for comfort.

The flaming wreckage behind her warmed her back. A reminder that wrongs had to be righted, at any cost. "If not for this child's actions, none would have perished today. By the Code, let her accept her punishment. Stand away. I will not tell you again."

Meleta's mouth opened in a silent wail. Astraea could almost hear it. And in it, an echo of a time long since past. When she herself had screamed her despair to the uncaring universe.

Kallika, the girl who killed six of her peers in drunken revelry with an aircar she'd stolen and driven illegally, stepped around her mother and approached the justicar. Astraea looked upon her with sorrowful approval and prepared to end this child and any future she might have once had. Kallika looked up into Astraea's eyes and said, "I'm sorry."

"As am I-"

Before the justicar could fire, the girl's mother yanked her away and threw herself at Astraea's feet. "No! Please, wait!"

"Unacceptable."

"I am responsible! Not my Kallika."

"Yours were not the hands on the controls. Yours was not the mouth that imbibed alcohol and caused this travesty-"

"But I am the one who raised this child. I am the one who failed to teach her right from wrong," Meleta begged with such passion that it moved the justicar. "I am the one responsible."

The Code had a lot to say about ultimate responsibility. Astraea considered the matter, tapping her fingers on her lower lip. She looked from one tear-streaked face to the other. Killika fought to get back to the fore, but her mother kept her from doing so. Both cried and cursed the other. _Such is love. That one would sacrifice everything for the other._

Finally, Astraea said, "Acceptable."

With that one simple word, she fired. The bullet ripped through Meleta's skull, spraying grey matter on the pavement. The woman crumpled in a heap.

Kallika threw herself over the corpse and screamed, "Mother!"

"Justice is served. The Code is satisfied." Astraea made to turn away, back to her path. Back to her mission.

The girl's sobbing voice stopped her. "How can you be so cold? How can you be so cruel?"

"The cruelty is _mine_? For her part in the making of you, she has paid. And bought you a future. With this, you also did not escape punishment. Do not let her sacrifice be in vain. Take this lesson to heart. As I did." The justicar commanded the girl's utmost attention with her sympathetic, but stern gaze. "There are consequences to our choices. There is _always_ a ransom to be paid."

With that, the justicar strode away through the colony's commons. Kallika's cries of grief rang in her ears. Sadness made her steps heavy. Astraea consoled herself by silently reciting sutras.

If the justicar hadn't happened by to witness the collision and ascertain the cause, it might have turned out much differently for Kallika and her mother. Both would have survived, for one. The girl would have been in police custody and on her way to face a jury of her peers.

Which is better? thought Astraea. Would that have sufficed to deter the girl from her destructive path? Will this, the death of her mother, accomplish that? Or drive her further away from the light?

Astraea put doubt aside. No use imagining what might have been._ I was there. That is all._

She turned her attention to the ship docked at the spaceport. The one she'd come to investigate. And perhaps there she'd find a lead. A step closer to fulfilling her promise. A step closer to meeting fate.

* * *

The ship stank of offal and terror. Of too many bodies crammed into its cargo spaces. Through the vents, she could hear them moaning their despair. Occasionally, a shouted order and subsequent sharp cry resounded through the tight maintenance shaft Astraea inched along.

She grimaced at the idea of those suffering not three meters away, her sense of injustice chiding her for her patience. It demanded she fly out of the corridor that ran parallel to the inhabited parts of the ship and destroy these abusers, these traders in misery.

Only the idea that if she did, her target might escape her grasp and, thus, cause even more misery out in the cosmos stayed her hand.

Silently, Astraea swore to those people bleeding and crying out that she'd return and see these slavers cast down.

Muted conversation drew her toward the fore of the ship. Ducking down a smaller tunnel, she leaned into a grate to hear better.

". . . you know Boss Silva wouldn't like it." Astraea's heart thudded at the name the one, a turian by the sound of it, mentioned. She willed it back into its slower rhythm as she concentrated. The turian continued, "She wants the whole lot sold."

"Yeah? Well, Silva ain't _my_ boss. She don't pay me to feed all these fleshbags. Selling the weak ones won't half pay what I spent keeping them breathing. I say we space the sickly ones and skip out to Omega to sell the rest. Aria's paying top cred for bodies to mine her asteroid." That one, a batarian, snorted in contempt. "Silva don't even have to know."

"Boss Silva," corrected the turian, "It'll be all our asses if she does, though. She's got her eye on us, make no mistake. And I have no intention of getting myself flayed, spaced, or used for target practice just because a pyjak slaver doesn't know how to follow orders." Threat laced his words, overt and deadly. Astraea heard the undeniable whine of a loading heatsink.

The batarian backpedaled, "Wait, friend, I'm just saying." To something the turian did, the slaver sucked in his breath and blurted, "Okay, okay. We'll sell them all. I got-I got a pal on Illium who'll take the skinny ones for his 'ponic farms. Doctor the paperwork so's they look indentured and all. The rest we'll take to Aria, yeah?"

"Get this boat in gear, then. We got to finish this deal quick, then I gotta head out to report to the boss." The turian feet clicked on the decking as he left the cockpit. "She doesn't like to be kept waiting."

"Sure, sure," the slaver called after the turian. Then muttered, "Merc bastard."

Astraea heard enough to confirm her suspicion. The turian was the one she wanted. He'd lead her to Silva.

Using her booted feet, she kicked through the grate and slid into the room, coming up in a crouch in front of the startled batarian. Before he could even so much as utter a word, she shot him, one round through the cranium.

Muffled shouting on the other side of the door informed her that the pistol's loud report did not go unnoticed. The justicar slid to one side of that portal just as it opened and put her gun to the investigating slaver's skull, pulling the trigger in one smooth action.

As that body dropped right across the threshold, an alarm wailed throughout the ship. Astraea peered into the long hall that led to the cargo bay and saw at least a dozen more flesh-peddlers scrambling to meet her with weapons drawn. And at the very end, her turian swung toward her with astonishment.

Astraea tossed a biotic stasis at him, which he rolled to avoid. He shouted to the rest, "Take her out!"

The justicar dropped back into cover as a hail of bullets pounded into the portal. When they paused to reload, she leaned out and picked off five of them, then performed a more complicated mimetic. A huge glowing ball grew to size in their midst, picking half of them up off their feet.

A bullet tore through her shoulder and she fell back with a hiss. With a mental shove, she put the agony to the back of her mind. Reloading, she dropped into a crouch and peeked out just enough to finish off the slavers floating around in the air. Sweet relief flooded her as the medi-gel injectors in her suit numbed her wound.

The turian hid behind the others, safely tucked in the lee of his own piece of cover. She had to find a way to get to him before he fled the ship. Taking a chance, Astraea darted out of cover in a charge. The remaining slavers tried to pick her off, but she stayed just ahead of their curtain of fire.

She tucked her shoulder and rammed into a towering crate she knew at least two of them cowered behind. It toppled, crushing the unfortunate men under it. Not pausing to watch, Astraea ran straight at another slaver, trusting her shields to deflect his bullets. An orange blade flicked out of her omnitool at her silent command.

Her intended target started to realize she wasn't stopping. Astraea felt a grim sort of satisfaction as her omniblade sunk deep into the man's belly. She carried him with her to the protected side of another crate, using him to shield her from oncoming fire. She paused for a moment to catch her breath. Counting the panicked shouts, she tallied only three remaining slavers. Not including her turian, who must be taken alive to answer some very pointed questions.

Astraea tossed another stasis at a retreating slaver, then followed up with a burst of lethal gunfire. She clipped another with it and that man went down in a screaming heap, clutching his shattered kneecap.

She heard dual-toned cursing and knew her turian must have thought of retreating, for the elevator at his back to the lower levels slid open with a swish. No, he could not be allowed to get away.

The justicar put a bullet in the wounded slaver to end him and searched out the last one. She found him cringing behind a low table. He gibbered and dropped his weapon at the sight of her, crying, "Mercy! Mercy!"

She didn't even dignify that absurdity with a vocal response, just planted a bullet in his heart and kept moving. The door opened at her hand on an empty lift. She stepped in and pressed down, the only direction it could go. Odds were, she'd find him heading toward the shuttle bay, trying to escape her by stealing a transport and heading off world.

As soon as it started down, the lift groaned and trembled under her feet. She narrowed her eyes at this development. With a loud boom that rocked the elevator, Astraea felt the cable give way with a sound of shearing metal. As the lift plummeted, the justicar quelled a surge of panic. It would serve no purpose here, other than getting her killed.

Her feet left the decking and she peered down at them, an idea forming in her mind. Flaring every eezo sensitive node in her flesh, she started to float in earnest. Just in time too, for the lift crashed into the bottom of the shaft with enough force to liquify bone. Doubtless, if she had not negated her own momentum, that would have been the end of her quest.

The doors shuddered and creaked open, the mechanism whining and shrieking as it did. Astraea felt a rare flash of amusement as she found herself staring at the startled and frustrated face of the same turian she pursued. He stood at the far end of the room at the door to the cargo hold.

She couldn't resist commenting in dry tones, "Thank you for speeding up that infernal device."

He cursed at her from across the room. The door past him opened, and he ran from her, threading through the slave pens. She noted that he did not head starboard, where the shuttle bay opened on the docks. What was he doing?

Shouting from ahead alerted her to the fact that more slavers must be down here, guarding the chattel. Astraea counted her remaining heatsinks, running a thumb across where they lined her belt. One, just one. Four shots, total.

Her gut sank as she espied the bulky silhouette of a krogan heading her way. Four shots wouldn't even put a dent in that thing.

The krogan paused as it spotted her, then grinned a contemptuous grin. "Must be a justicar. Only asari bitches I know that go into battle with their boobs hanging out."

Pressing her lips in a grim line, she eyed the weapon the beast had dangling from his fist. An energy whip, designed not to kill, but to incapacitate in the most painful way possible. A touch of its nanofilaments would send electricity shooting through her nervous system. From the deft way the krogan snapped it once in the air between them, he knew how to wield it well.

She put away her pistol and flicked out her omniblade. Then, pausing to consider him, flicked out the right one, too. Two orange blades flickered on the ends of her arms and she rued the lack of a helpful grenade or two.

This would be a hard fight. Even without the whip, krogan had an annoying tendency of being nigh unkillable.

Putting away her trepidation, Astraea stalked toward the giant. He chuckled, a dark, deep sound. "We don't have to fight. I could show you a good time another way, sweet thing. Work that fine, blue ass into a lather."

She lobbed a stasis at him, which he nimbly dodged. He struck out with that crackling whip. She had to flip sideways to slip over its wide arc. Then, the justicar slid close and scored a hit along the krogan's left forearm. The omniblade sliced through his armor like tissue paper.

The hulking alien grunted in pain then slapped at her with the back of that hand. It glanced off her shoulder, turning her backward leap into a sprawl. Astraea grimaced as she lunged back into a balanced stance. She squared off with her opponent and glared at him with cold fury.

"Maybe having a real male between your legs would melt some of that ice." Then he came on with a barrage of powerful overhand swipes, keeping her at a distance. She had to leap to and fro to avoid getting hit. "Or maybe it's true what they say about you justicars sewing your cunts shut."

Astraea looked for a way to negate his advantage. Get in close, strip that weapon out of his hand and give her a chance to do some damage with her knives. If he forced her to keep dodging like this, she'd tire much quicker than he. She didn't like the idea of being at this slaver's mercy.

As she flung herself over another brutal lash, inspiration struck. She sneered. "As if your tiny member could even begin to please any female."

The krogan growled, deep and menacing. _Yes, here is an avenue with potential,_ she thought.

"No more words, krogan? One would think that you'd have a lot more practice using that tongue than what must be a truly pathetic example of manhood." She filled her expression with pure contempt, glancing down at his codpiece. "I believe I'd need a nanoscope to even find it."

With a shout of rage, the krogan charged forward, no longer careful about her getting too close. Satisfaction curled around her thoughts, _That's right. Get mad. Get stupid._

Krogan are ever touchy about comments regarding their sexual prowess. The genophage made them a race of impotent men and heart-sore women. Astraea felt a tiny shard of regret for using that tragedy to her advantage, but disregarded it as a meaty fist almost found its way around her neck.

Using a crosscut that slid over the whip handle, she felt her omniblade cut deep into the flesh of his wrist. A simple rotational twist and she severed all the tendons there. The whip fell to the deck, much to the delight of the slaves in their cages around her. A ragged cheer went up.

Clutching his wound, the krogan heaved himself after her, intent on bludgeoning her with his bulk. She, deft and quick, flanked him by ducking under his reaching arm. The point of her blade slid between his ribs with ease, sizzling as it cauterized everything upon its entry.

The krogan went rigid as she bisected one of his two heart clusters. The other knife she dug in on the other side to remind him she had a second blade. She leaned into his hump and spoke right into his aural canal, "Where has the turian gone, if not to the shuttles?"

He spat bloody phlegm on the deck. "Keigan? You're after that merc piece of shit?" Then, he started laughing.

"What, pray tell, is so amusing?"

The krogan heaved, trying to throw her off, but she clung tight to his side and thrust her knife just a little deeper. He let out a choked scream, then subsided, and grinned a pained grin. "That twist came yelling in here, after his property like some feral pyjak broodmother. I did your dirty work for you, justicar. Normally, I charge sixty percent, but let me go and we'll call it even."

He killed the turian? Anger stewed under her tight control. _Back to square one, it seems_.

Astraea looked around. At all the cages. All the sentient peoples of different races stolen from their lives who stared back at her with hope and horror. Many of whom exhibited scars from that same weapon that had been in this krogan's hand.

Bringing her disgusted regard back to the slaver, she adjusted the angle of her knife by a fraction and struck, deep and true. "No."

Dead before he even hit the ground, the krogan toppled forward, sliding off the points of her knives. Then, with a deep breath of resignation, she faced the soon to be former slaves. "I am looking for a turian. Once I confirm that he is alive or dead, I will free all of you."

Frightened, but clearly hopeful, they watched in silence as she picked her way past them. A small hand shot out of a cage and grasped her wrist. She looked down at it and followed it past a skinny wrist to a sallow, wrinkled human face. Rheumy, watery eyes looked up at her in terror.

"What is it?" For she felt somehow that this slave had something of import to impart.

The old man whispered, as though afraid to be overheard, "He went inside the arena. No one comes back from the arena alive. 'Cept Gargath." He pointed to the deceased krogan.

Astraea looked from face to face and found confirmation in each. She looked along the cages into the deep shadows at the far end with a touch of trepidation.

"Please. Don't go," begged the slave.

"I must. There is something that must be done." She patted the old man's hand and graced them all with a serene smile. "Do not worry. I will be back."

This placated them, though she felt the weight of their stares as she made her way to the darkened portion of the cargo hold. Her eyes adjusted to the gloom enough to make out a wall enclosing this section. Floor to ceiling, with a single opening in one side. She slipped through it and nearly stumbled over a body lying in her path.

Flaring her biotic aura to a dim glow, she reached down and flipped the corpse over. It was her turian. She resisted the faint urge to give him a kick. Instead, she rifled through his pockets. Nothing. Nothing whatsoever. It seemed this whole thing had been a waste.

Admonishing herself, she thought of the slaves. Freeing them was enough. Though it did set her back on her main objective.

A shuffling noise nearby drew her attention. She brightened her aura just in time to catch a small, blurry shape running at her in the dark with a shiny object in its hand. Astraea waved a complex mimetic at it and winced away from the sudden blossoming of a singularity so close it almost caught her as well.

And floating in the heart of it . . ., a human child. Surprise drew her brows up as she took in the long knife in the girl's hand, poised in a deadly upward stab. A stab that would have gutted Astraea had she been but a second slower in her defense.

A closer inspection brought some startling facts to light. The child was small and slight, but strong. Lean but developed muscles twitched under her fair skin, which scars crosshatched in pale relief. Her belly, arms and legs lay bare, but a rudimentary sort of armor protected ribcage and loins. Someone had cut her dark hair short and jagged. That, combined with the piles of bodies that lay along the arena walls, convinced Astraea that this girl, little more than a toddler, had been used as a gladiator.

Fury alighted in the justicar's guts. That someone could use a child so. She felt fiercely glad, then, that she'd killed them all.

The tiny fighter spun in the singularity until she came face to face with Astraea, only inverted. The keen assessment in the child's pale brown, almost honey-colored eyes struck the asari to the core. Then, Astraea watched, amazed, as this girl reached out with her off-hand as though to touch the justicar's face.

Her bruised and scarred face broke into a wondrous smile and she whispered, in broken common, "Pretty!"

It startled a chuff from her and she replied, "Drop the knife."

"Okay." The steel clanged on the decking. Astraea kicked it away. It clattered along the floor until it fetched up against the turian's corpse. The girl reached out to the dead man. "'Gan!"

Astraea saw the wild grief in the child's eyes and puzzled it over. Perhaps the dead turian was her master? She watched as tears started to flow away from the slave's eyes, pulled out into the singularity to drift around in the air. Strange how the girl wept in utter silence. Was that also something slaves learned?

The justicar considered her options. Would the slave strike out again at her if released? She did not want to kill the child, but would if she had to. "Keigan was your master?"

"Yes." Sniffles, loud and pitiable, filled the silence. "Gar-guff kilt'em. Cuz the bettin' weren't done."

"If I let you down, will you be calm?"

Astraea watched closely for deception as the girl replied, "Yes."

"You won't attack me again?"

"Won't." Nothing but sincerity there. The child affixed her with complete earnestness as she turned her head this way and that to keep the justicar in sight. The blue bubble hummed as the slave spun slowly within it.

Astraea dispelled the singularity. The girl fell on her rump, then sprang to her feet, running to the fallen Keigan. She patted the dead turian's face, sorrow explicit in every movement. "'Gan was a good'un. Never hit me much. Never let no one touch me. 'Only the 'renas,' he said. 'Make me coin in the pit and I'll take care of you. Like you was fambly.'"

The justicar didn't have the heart to point out Keigan's faults, how he'd taken a little girl and made her a killer. Not in the face of the girl's sadness. Hard reality could come later, gently broken to the child in kind words. Astraea looked around and found cameras mounted in every corner of the 'pit', as the slave had called it.

She turned back to the girl. "You said Gargath killed Keigan because the betting wasn't finished."

"Yeah, I fight, they watch on holo and bet, only it never were finished, 'cuz the alarums went off. I only came after you, 'cuz I thought you was the next . . .," the girl's face screwed up in concentration as she finished her sentence, "cha-llen-ger. Gotta be fast. Gotta be quick to win. I'm sorry, Pretty."

When the girl stood and came to her side, looking up at her in child-like wonder with those huge eyes of such unusual hue, Astraea felt a stirring in her chest. A feeling long forgotten. A memory of another child looking up at her so from her side. She couldn't look away from the girl as those painful remembrances threatened to swamp her.

Luckily, the slave broke the stare first and looked back at her dead 'benefactor'. "'Gan said a few more fights, then he and me'd go see the biggest ocean ever and meet the boss lady."

With shock and more eagerness than she'd normally allow, Astraea inquired, "The boss lady?"

"Yeah, name of Bossilba. She's a pretty blue lady. Like you. Got white marks on her cheeks," said the girl, demonstrating with two diagonal slashes under her eyes, "like this."

"Did Keigan ever tell you the name of the place he was going to meet Silva?" What an unexpected boon.

"Don' rightly know the name, but 'Gan showed me on the big glowing map."

Opportunity knocked but rarely and while her Code might in some ways object to using a child to gain information, it definitely agreed that Silva had to be found and punished for all the asari mercenary had done. In the distant past and here, in the present.

There was something about the slave girl that intrigued Astraea and she knew a reluctance to let her out of sight. "It will take some hours to arrange passage for the other freed slaves and to inform local authorities to what has transpired here. Then, I will leave. I give you a choice. You can go with the others and possibly locate your people; a home, a family. Or . . . you can help me find Silva."

"Ain't never had no 'people', not like them out there. I's slave-born." The girl's look turned canny, far beyond her scant few years, as she eyed Astraea. "You gonna kill Silba?"

"Yes." She could tell the child appreciated such bald honesty, though the girl's complete lack of reaction to the inherent violence of the statement disconcerted the asari. "Does that bother you?"

The slave shrugged. "D'pends, I guess. Some'uns deserve it."

"Indeed, some do."

Again, those honey brown eyes speared the justicar and saw far more truth than what a child her age ever should. "She musta done somethin' awful."

"Yes, she did."

The child considered her, then thrust her skinny arms up in the air. Automatically, Astraea bent to lift her onto a hip, marveling at how slight the weight in her arms seemed. And how familiar. Another piece of the past come to haunt her. "What's your name, child?"

"Slave-born ain't got no names. Garg-uff called me Rat sometimes. 'Gan told folk I was his little sister. He got a big ol' laugh out of that every time. Silly old 'Gan." Bright, unshed tears welled in the girl's eyes.

Astraea felt a spark of warmth then, for the dead turian. For perhaps in his rough way, he had cared for the savage fighter in his possession. Must have, for this girl to have loved him so. After all, he could have abandoned her to save his own life and didn't. "Then, Sister it is."


	2. Chapter 2

_Betrayed. Violated in every conceivable way. The woman who would become known as Astraea the Justicar knelt on broken knees in the expanding pool of her own blood and bowed her once proud head._

_Around her cackled the minions of her tormentor. But, helpless to stop herself, she focused on the high-pitched screams that came from somewhere close at hand, but utterly out of reach. An amused hum from her daughter's torturer followed every shriek, every pained cry. If her broken and useless arms had allowed it, Astraea would have brought them up to cover her face. _

_For shame burned at her heart. All of this was her fault. If not for her sins and selfish ambition, none of this would have come to pass. _

_She started as Silva, once her closest friend, touched her cheek and spoke in warm alto tones, "Did you think I wouldn't find out? Did you think you could keep this little nest secret forever?"_

_Astraea licked cracked and bloody lips and rasped through vocal cords worn ragged by continuous screaming, "Leave her alone. This-you and I, has nothing to do with her."_

_"No, but it does have everything to do with what I want. It was fun, while it lasted. Our little partnership. But now, I want your share, too. I'm done with only getting your leftovers." Suddenly, Silva filled her field of vision. Astraea reeled back in unthinking terror, only to be yanked back into place by Silva's henchmen. Agony coursed through her broken body. She choked on the bile that rose in her throat. Her tormentor laughed, gloating as she pulled Astraea's face back to meet her gaze. "And all it took to pin your slippery ass was finding the right leverage."_

_"You want the crown. Take it. Kill me. Do whatever you want. Just please. Let her go." _

_"Bring her here," said Silva to her men. One, a crafty old krogan named Mogul, threw the tiny asari child into Silva's arms._

_At the sight of her bound and bleeding daughter, Astraea struggled anew. A kick from Silva on her broken hip quelled the last of her rebellion. Silva thrust the child close to her mother, their faces only a few inches apart. The girl tried to fling herself at Astraea, but the mercenaries kept the pair apart. Astraea didn't even have strength left to curse them for their cruelty. She tried to project calm as she spoke to her daughter, "Cassia. Cassia, look at me."_

_"Maman! They-they-" Too young to know the right words, the girl's overwhelming fear for herself, her mother and their grievous injuries stole her voice. Cassia shrieked anew when Silva grasped the girl about the neck and started twisting her head to an untenable angle. She fought and clawed at Silva's arm, but what could a child do against an adult's strength? _

_"Sh, sh. I know. Just look at me, okay?"_

_And she tried so hard to do as her mother asked, though panic suffused her features. Her wail climbed in pitch, so high, so full of fright._

_"Dear heart, I love you. Maman will always love-" A sharp crack resounded through the suddenly silent room. That sound wove its way into Astraea's soul and seared itself there amid the ashes of her heart. Ragged and wet pants fell out of her gaping mouth as she watched Cassia's eyes go dim. Nonsense thoughts flitted in the horrified emptiness of her mind. _This can't be real. A bright light like Cassia could not just go out like that. Impossible.

_"Damn, that's cold, boss," chuckled Mogul._

_Astraea tried to summon something, but she had nothing left to comfort her, not even hate. Only the great and terrible guilt remained, riding atop the wave of profound grief that so bled her dry. Far deeper a cut than the many wounds inflicted on her flesh. _

_Silva dropped Cassia like just so much rubbish. "You know how much I hate secrets. We were supposed to share everything. But no, you just had to start hiding things from me, kjære." (My lover)_

_Astraea cringed away from the awful words and managed to whisper, "End it."_

_"No. I think I'll leave you here for the vorcha scavengers. I hear they like their meals still breathing when they start to gnaw on them." They threw her to the ground and left, chattering and laughing as they went._

_Astraea's eyes never left Cassia, and despite the agony, with what will she had left, she reached out and covered the little girl's hand with her own shattered one. So wrong. How could it have ended like this? _

_If she had the power, she'd take it all back. All her ill-gotten riches and ruthless reputation, she'd abandon-no, never seek to begin with if only the Goddess gave Cassia back to her. How to even begin to make amends? A thousand apologies, a million restitutions would never be enough. And though it was infinitely too little and far too late, she pulled Cassia's cooling hand to her lips and kissed the tiny knuckles, whispering, "I'm sorry."_

* * *

Shivering, Astraea sat bolt upright in her bunk with a choked gasp. Tears stung her fevered cheeks as they coursed down her face. She wiped them away with her palms as she considered her nightmare.

That particular vision, her darkest memory, hadn't visited her in a long time. Doubtless triggered by the small and strange companion she's somehow gained on her voyage. The ship hummed around her, comforting and presently real. It dispelled the last of the horror.

She swung her legs off the bed and stood, wincing as the motion pulled at the wound in her shoulder. The bullet went clean through, in and out, but even medi-gel could not heal instantly. It still took time to completely recover.

Astraea dressed in casual robes and walked to the small lounge of the vessel she'd commissioned for the trip. A tiny freighter that hauled spices, the captain of it had been glad to have her aboard. A little extra protection in this dangerous part of the galaxy never hurt.

The small window in the common area that opened on the universe beckoned her to sit before it, which she did. Perhaps some meditation would help calm her spirit and clear her vision. She still did not know fully what compelled her to take the child, Sister, with her. Three days later and she still didn't know if it had been right or wrong to do so.

It wasn't that the girl had become problematic. Quite the opposite, in fact. Quiet and ever respectful, Sister had slotted herself into the justicar's life with very little fuss. She didn't run. She didn't yell. She didn't play as other children ought at her age. Astraea realized she didn't even know the girl's age. The girl may not even know her own age. She looked around twenty by asari standards. Astraea's foraging for information on human children had uncovered the startling information that twenty in asari years equated about five in human years. Such strangeness. It unsettled her that she didn't know anything about the care and feeding of human children.

Luckily, Sister seemed just fine taking care of herself, though getting her clean had been a trial. As had the medical check. But everything had turned out alright there. The girl had been remarkably healthy, despite evidence of past trauma; broken bones, punctured spleen, all taken care of at the time of the event. Despite the brutal ends, whoever had been responsible for her health took care of her. She must have been quite the commodity. There hadn't even been a control chip attached to her brain stem. Though that made sense. Those devices sometimes interfered with kinesthesiology. A fighter had to move well to fight to their utmost ability.

Some time later, a cup was placed near her hand. The distinct clatter of plastic on metal gave it away. Astraea breathed in the scent of the green tea, her favorite kind, with a sort of gratitude mixed with exasperation. She spoke to the silent presence at her side, "Thank you, Sister. But you did not have to bring me tea."

She could almost hear the girl become crestfallen and let go of the higher vistas of her meditational reverie to see just what she expected. The human girl sat at her side and looked down at her bare toes in dejection. Even clean and dressed in civilized attire, the former slave still looked savage. With her messily shorn hair and many scars, she'd never be taken for a normal child. Not to mention she refused to wear shoes. Ever.

Taking pity on her, Astraea reached out and patted Sister's knee. "It was a kind thought."

Shining eyes in a suddenly joyous face lifted to hers. She couldn't help but echo that infectious smile with a small one of her own. Astraea sipped the proffered tea, then settled back into her trance.

"Whatcha doin'?" asked Sister.

"Meditating."

"Why?"

"To see myself from the outside. Center my thoughts on the Code and how well I have and may continue to follow it."

"What's the Code?" Curiosity, ever an endearing trait. Then, Sister exclaimed a short "Ah!" and brought thumb to middle finger. With a twist, a short, percussive sound issued from those digits. "Somethin' to do with Cap'n callin' you a-a jus . . . a justick-"

"A justicar, yes." Astraea pondered the girl's hand for a moment. How had she made that noise? "I am a justicar. And a justicar follows the Code."

"So, what is it?" How could she say no to that hunger for knowledge that lurked behind Sister's eyes?

"An ultimate Code of Justice, above reproach and beyond the laws of governments. The unjust must pay what is owed." She filled her words with her faith in her path, the awe she'd felt on first discovering it, and the humility with which she strove to keep it.

Now a light of a different sort filled the girl's gaze, something like hero worship. Her mouth opened to utter one word, "Cooool." Somehow that conveyed everything such a silly little word normally could not.

Astraea found the interest in her life's work strangely appealing. Most would not wander near enough to ask. Justicars were admired, idolized even, from afar, but feared when they passed close. She understood. For if she witnessed an injustice, she would be forced to act. To the degree it merited. Whole planets had been scorched before for their indiscretions. Back when justicars numbered in the thousands.

At her side, Sister emulated her posture, sitting cross-legged before the porthole. Astraea thought about stopping her, but saw no harm in it. Meditation could be quite a useful tool when one's heart became clouded by doubt.

Only a few moments passed before Sister said, "So, I just sit here."

Astraea sighed. "It is meant be a time to reflect on one's thoughts."

"What do I think 'bout?"

The justicar felt her lips stretch in a faint smile. "What do you want to think about?"

"I dunno."

The asari rolled her shoulders to loosen them. "I suppose if you are set on doing this with me, every day, then you must do it right. Meditate on this Sutra: True justice can only be seen from behind the veil of self ignorance. To be conscious of one's self and one's needs is to be tempted to poison the root of impartiality."

By the way the girl went still and silent, Astraea felt a wash of warmth at how seriously Sister had taken the Code's profundity to heart. Then, Sister said, "What's 'ignorance' mean?"

Chagrin colored Astraea's cheeks. Of course, a regular child would not know certain words, let alone an uneducated slave child. "It means 'to not know'."

"Oh." A few more minutes passed, then another query filled the silence. "What's imparsh-i-, imp-ar-shalloty mean?"

Shaking her head, the justicar chuckled. "Perhaps we should work on your vocabulary first."

"I talk good!" Indignation made the girl draw herself up like a queen.

" 'I talk _well_.' No matter. We'll have plenty of time before we get to Kahje to understand each other better."

"Kahje's where the big ocean is?"

"The hanar call it the Encompassing, and yes, there's leagues upon leagues of it."

Sister mused, "Fought a hanar once. They're really _squidgey._ All goo and gross stuff. Takes forever to find the new-rawl nexus."

One could almost forget that the girl had trained to be a killer. Until she said something like that. "How old are you, Sister? Do you know?"

"Course I know. They keep track so's they know when to send me on." Sister waved out at the stars that whizzed by. "Gotta know how to bracket der fights. The _real _fights. Not like on that boat. Those sad boys wouldn'ta lasted a min in the real 'rena." 'Boys,' so this child would call the grown men that had littered the floor of that pit.

"An interesting topic we will soon revisit, but not the answer I was looking for," she chided, with gentle humor.

"Oh! Sorry, Pret-I mean, Astraea." Sister's ill-use of common turned her name into 'Aster-ee-a'. The justicar pursed her lips to keep from smiling as the girl continued in all seriousness, "I's seven, but 'Gan writed me at five so's to keep me from gettin' thrown in with the big lugs. I's small and can act younger."

Astraea did a quick calculation in her head to translate the number to something analogous to her species. _Twenty-eight or thereabouts. _At thirty, asari start secondary schools. Start aligning themselves with a lifepath. The future, Sister's future, seemed an untenable place. Where could such a child find a good, fulfilling life? Could she ever learn to be 'normal?' She interrupted this unpleasant chain of thought with a question, "Big lugs?"

"Yeah, the league's dominaterated by krogan. Always had trouble with those boneheads. They's too big. Gotta stab deep, all over, 'cuz they got lotsa redund-redunda-" Sister fought with her limited understanding of language, but her waving hands illustrated her fervor. She clearly enjoyed the challenge of taking on so great a foe.

"Redundancies."

"Yeah, those. Redund-an-cies," she sounded it out, wrinkling her little nose in a way Astraea found far too adorable. "Gan, um, Kei-gan showed me a picture of their insides once. So many back-ups. Had to spend a whole day looking at it to 'member it all."

"The quickest and safest way to kill a krogan is with gren-" Astraea started as she realized what she was saying. To talk so frankly about killing and the methods thereof with a child . . ..

_But is Sister really a child? _

The Code held that a child who murders is not a child in truth. The protective cowl of innocence may be pierced early, but it can never be regained. Where, then, is the correct path for her in helping Sister find a place in the cosmos? She had to think it over. Find reason amid this chaos.

The girl seemed to read her mood, standing and saying, "I gotta go to the bathroom." It sounded more like a request than a statement.

"Go ahead. You do not need my permission. You are no longer a slave."

Sister grinned at her as she scampered off. She tossed back over her shoulder, "Cleaned your gun! Even the fiddly bits!"

Astraea sighed in exasperation, shoulders dropping. She called back, "We talked about this. You do not have to serve in any capacity."

The girl looked around the doorjamb and smirked. "Wanted to." Then she disappeared from sight

The justicar wanted to stand and follow her for a more serious discussion, but let it go with another sigh. What harm was there, really?

Meditation irrevocably broken for the time being, Astraea decided to update her log. Every justicar kept an account of their deeds, their reasonings and their judgments. The recordings downloaded to the Archives on Thessia every seven-day. A week by the galaxy's reckoning.

In her mind and memory, she heard the soft, dry voice of her _Didaskala_, her mentor, '_For we are held accountable to ourselves before any other. An unjust justicar is dealt with by the others quickly and thoroughly.'_

Her response then had followed, '_But the Assembly does not appoint justicars in any official way. Why would they turn from their own quests to put down a transgressor when they could just as easily decry her publicly?'_

_'For just that reason, the actions of one must be the actions of all, or it is the actions of no justicar. To let one stray from the path and still call herself justicar would reduce the whole of us to thugs and assassins. We stay above personal gain, we eye the line between justice and vengeance with a wariness bordering on paranoia. Thus it should be.'_ Her mentor looked at her with raised brow. '_When I found you in that alley and asked you who killed your daughter, what was your answer?'_

_'I did.' _In memory and in present, Astraea shivered.

_'I saw in you the repentant, even as the Code demanded your life once I found out who you were. The Code is not merciful, nor forgiving. Do you know why I spared you?'_

_'Because a justicar does give her life. To the Code.'_

_'All that you were is dead. Astraea Corso, the Corsair, leader of the Dire Corbies mercenary band, is dead. All that remains is Astraea the justicar.' _Her mentor stood tall above the kneeling Astraea. '_We are not chosen, we choose. We are not appointed, we either are or are not Justicar, singly and all. The Code abides no faltering, no given quarter. No choice without responsibility-'_

_"No crime without punishment." _She finished the litany aloud, an echo of this hallowed remembrance.

Her mentor demanded, _'Is your cause just?'_

_'Yes.'_

_'Do you pursue this Silva with vengeance in your heart?'_

_'No. She is wicked and many will suffer if she is not stopped.'_

_'Then you have my blessing and sorrow, for there is not one of us that is unstained. Wickedness lives in every justicar's heart. Be vigilant against it. Or fall.'_

Astraea wished she had her mentor to call upon for guidance, but knew well the answer would be: Look to the Code. Follow the Sutras and you cannot be unjust. She wondered how the exalted justicar fared, out there among the stars chasing her own demons. She hadn't seen her mentor in nearly two centuries. Justicars only gathered when something large enough to require the Assembly's attention came to light. And woe unto whoever might be the focus of their fury.

It is said that one justicar is a massacre, but an entire Assembly of justicars is an a_nnihilation._

That had more weight when there had been more than a few dozen of them, but Astraea could not help a tiny welling of pride at the prevalence of her kind's fearsome reputation. Even with their small numbers, few would think to trifle with them.

She felt a pang then, for in all likeliness, in a few generations, there would be no justicars. It was a lonely road and one that seemed likely to only get lonelier.


	3. Chapter 3

"S'not her."

"Are you sure?" Disappointment colored her voice sour.

"Keigan said blue umbreller, red kiosk. There's the shop and there's the umbreller, but whoever's under it's a mite too tall and fat." Sister leaned further out into the downpour, peering through the binocs. "And . . . greenish-like."

Astraea took the binocs from the girl and looked for herself through the curtain of perpetual rain. "A krogan."

"Oh!" exclaimed her companion, "Must be Mogo, then. Bossilb-I mean, Silva's right-hand varren, Keigan called'em. He finds the matches, Silva books the venue an' gets the right pockets to show up. The pockets with the most cash."

"Mogul?" A shock ran up her spine as memory once again tried to steal her composure. Anticipation followed it. If it had to not be Silva, Mogul was the next best thing. He'd surely know where to find Silva.

In their long conversations aboard the freighter, Astraea learned that Silva had branched out into promoting underground gladiatorial matches. And blood sport was ever popular.

The lucrative venture funded the rest of Silva's operation, which suffered from stiff competition with the Eclipse, Blood Pack and Blue Suns mercenaries, groups fast rising to the pinnacle of the muscle-for-hire business. Ever since that huge ship attacked the Citadel a few weeks ago, it appeared Council space wasn't as secure as the governments had hoped. The scavengers at the edges could smell weakness lightyears off.

The Dire Corbies' military dominance might be waning, but Silva had found another avenue of revenue in her close partnership with batarian slavers.

Astraea had been amazed at the little girl's knowledge of the ins and outs of Silva's organization. Particularly the bits she must have put together herself. It showed a startling intelligence, to say the least.

A tug on her wrist pulled her out of her thoughts. Sister smirked up at her. "So, what are we gonna do next?"

"We?" The justicar shook her head. "_You _are going to stay here, out of harm's way, while I go have a talk with Mogul."

"Aw, but I can help!" She bounced around Astraea, pleading her case, "He knows me. I can tell him Keigan wants to meet somewheres else. I can- I can-"

Astraea held her hands up to stop the girl's tirade. "It's too dangerous. I won't bring a child into battle, especially not one who's already suffered so much."

"But you can't fight him out here! Too many peoples! Too tight! Too small!" She had a point. Astraea paused to look at her omnitool where a layout of this drell community lay in bold orange. She highlighted an area of the spaceport wharves. It would be empty enough at this time of day. The workers will have quit for rest and rejuvenation, to be resumed at daybreak once again. But how to lure the krogan there? Quite unintentionally, her gaze fell upon Sister's upturned, hopeful face. The girl wheedled, "Pleeeeaaase?"

Should she stop treating Sister as a helpless child? Neither word defined the girl to her satisfaction. Again, her Code didn't have an answer for her. So, without prejudice of preconception, she looked at Sister with only an eye to ability. Sister looked back, a small, canny and dangerous survivor, asking for trust. Astraea's trust.

Which she found in herself a willingness to give. To a certain point. A reasonable point. "Alright," she started, but had to hold up a warning hand against the celebratory shout that might have burst from Sister's lips, "But only to tell him to go to the spaceport. Dockside, got it? Then you stay well away."

Sister nodded to show she understood, a fierce light in her eyes. Anticipation, and determination making her look all the more primal. She mussed her hair into a wild tangle and did the same to her clothes, tearing the sleeves a bit, before looking up at Astraea with a predator's cunning. "Can't look all neat. Mogo'll get suspicerous."

The justicar sighed. "I just bought you those. Fine. Go. Be quick. And Sister-"

The girl looked back, pausing in her mad scramble toward the waiting krogan.

"Be careful."

With a grin wide enough to show the missing teeth abreast of the front ones, Sister resumed her sprint.

Astraea watched her ward fly along the sidewalk, showing enormous courage approaching that brute with such zeal. Sister bounced into Mogul with a shouted greeting. The huge krogan lifted her up by the back of her shirt to look at her eye to orange slit-pupilled eye. Too far away to make out their exchange, Astraea fought a bout of anxiety as the girl pointed in the direction of the spaceport. Mogul grumbled a surprised question, to which Sister shrugged and rolled her eyes. Such insolence in a slave might be met poorly.

The justicar tensed as the krogan's other hand came up, maybe to strike. Mogul patted Sister on the head, and the asari forced herself to relax. When Mogul set Sister on her bare feet, Astraea muttered, "Okay, now get out of there."

Sister made to be away, but a growled command from Mogul stopped her. The girl made some excuse and pointed to a kiosk of sweets nearby, but Mogul cut her off with a bark. Under the krogan's watchful eye, Sister bowed her head and trudged in the direction of the wharves ahead of him.

Astraea held back a curse with difficulty. This complicated matters. Mogul must have demanded the girl lead him to Keigan.

Taking to the roofs, the justicar raced to arrive there ahead of them and struggled to come up with a plan to get them both out of this mess.

* * *

"I knew Keigan was stupid, but letting you run around on your own. Doesn't he know how much money we have invested in you? What an ass."

"Said I was good an' I oughta go get me some sweets." Sister picked her way around puddles. The heavy rain had ceased, leaving the atmosphere cold and foggy.

"Why does this feel like an ambush?" croaked Mogul, as he and Sister marched between the shipping containers below her. Astraea crept along, waiting for an opportunity to extricate Sister from her predicament. The krogan sniffed the air and affixed the girl with one baleful eye. "And since when do you ever bathe?"

"You're one to talk, bonehead." The girl burst into motion, her small, hard fist colliding with the side of the krogan's knee. Sister stripped the assault rifle off Mogul's back and when it proved too unwieldy for her slight frame, tossed it into the ocean. Mogul, big though he is, crumpled to one side. She shouted over the krogan's roar of outrage, "And ambush it is, stupid!"

Recognizing her cue, Astraea leapt, crashing down upon the krogan's plated back. Her weight flattened Mogul momentarily. She thrust her omniblade deep into his side a couple times before jumping away, knowing full well Mogul had only to roll her under him to crush her. Neither hit proved fatal and Mogul, enraged and full of spite, scrambled to his feet and squared off with her.

Astraea shouted to Sister, "Now, run! I will handle him."

Stubborn, the girl only shook her head a furious negative, her face set in a scowl as she circled around Mogul's back. The krogan spun to keep them both in view.

"Peachin' to the cops, now, you little rat? After all we did for you?" He swiped at the girl with his claws, but nimble as a feline, she danced away from him.

"You made me hurt all them peoples, just so's I stayed sharp!" Sister spat at his feet, contempt twisting her little face into an all too adult expression.

The justicar lobbed a stasis. It caught the krogan full in the side, but Mogul just shrugged off its effect after a second or two. He spun toward Astraea and froze, astonishment twisting his craggy features for a moment before he rumbled a deep and sour laugh. "Well, look who it is. How's it going, _boss?"_

"I'm not your boss anymore, traitor."

Mogul grinned. "That's right. Silva took the reins, didn't she. Had better plans, better payoffs. Fewer scruples."

"Where is Silva, Mogul? Tell me and I will kill you quick."

"You think she doesn't know you're gunning for her? That picking apart her organization didn't sting her mightily? And now you're, what, stealing our property?" Mogul swept a hand out toward Sister. "Pretty low for a justicar, taking on slaves."

"I freed her."

"To do what? Your dirty work? Or are you collecting little girls now?" The krogan smiled at the flash of fury that must be evident in her face. "Oh, that's right, we killed the one that was yours. So you wanna take ours to replace her?"

From the depths of her fiery maelstrom of a mind, a single thought surfaced. The Code. Always the Code. It cooled the hate that threatened to spew forth. Astraea took a deep breath and stated, cold as a wintry sea, "Where is Silva?"

"Tell you what. Let me go and I'll take you there myself."

Disdain for this male and all he stood for filled her. "Once a betrayer, always a betrayer?"

"I follow the path of least resistance."

"And you are poorer for it."

Sister interrupted their dialogue, "She's at the Burrow, he said. On the way here."

"You little bitch!" Mogul lunged at the little girl, quicker than she could dodge. A huge hand slapped Sister into a shipping container with a resounding thud.

Astraea darted between them, warding the krogan off with glowing fists. Strike after strike she blocked, fast as lightning. One last exchange and she somersaulted mid-air, kicking out with both feet. Mogul went flying away, landing on his rump some distance away. She risked a glance behind, where the girl swayed, having gotten back on her feet. "Sister, are you alright?"

"Yeah. Been hit harder. Hear that, Mogul? You hit like a salarian!" Such pluck warmed the justicar's heart, as did the fire in the girl's eyes as she once again took on a fighting stance.

Mogul clambered back to his feet and set himself for a charge, his orange eyes narrowed in fury. Astraea flicked out her omniblades and nodded to the left, _Flank him._

Sister grinned a savage grin and muttered, "Right."

With a roar, the krogan ran at them. At the last minute, the pair split, spinning to each side. Astraea swept back in low, her knives diving for his hamstrings. The flesh sizzled under their glow. With a leaping kick almost twice her height, Sister propelled Mogul forward. Momentum unstoppable and with two unresponsive legs, the krogan crashed into and through a huge crate. Shouted curses in the dark beyond heralded news that Mogul remained alive.

Astraea made to go after him, but a small hand on her wrist stopped her. She looked down into Sister's mischievous honeyed gaze. The girl said, "Might wanna move it back a bit."

A pin dangled from her other fist. The justicar swept her up and leapt back just as a resounding boom preceded a fireball flying out of the crumpled shipping container. The immense heat seared the skin of her face as she hid Sister from the blast.

Sister laughed and joked, "You's right. Grenades do work better."

Shaking her head at the strange and bloodthirsty creature under her arm, she straightened and eyed the wreckage. No use looking for a body there. Inferno grenades didn't leave much but ash. She huffled a little chuckle and said, "Now we just have to find this 'Burrow'."

"Weren't far, he said. Must be here, on Kahje."

"Sound reasoning. Perhaps it is a place well known." Astraea searched the name on the local extranet and came up with several references and maps. Luck was with them. It lay not a kilometer away.

"Mogul was all excited about a big fight. Said I was top billing and he had a load of creds on me. Could be another little trick could get us in?"

"And put you in danger again?"

The girl looked from her to the vast sea and back, solemn.

"I don't think I ever been safe a day in my life."

Truer words had never been spoken. But to hear such wisdom from a child-no, not a child. Never a child. Never _allowed _to have a childhood. To try to constrain her back into the make-believe net of false security would be wrong. She'd seen too much, knew too much. Treating her as a guileless child now would be degrading.

Sorrow pricked Astraea, deep and painful. Astraea pulled Sister close and embraced her. She'd weep later for the child who never was, but for now, a duty had to be done. A task finally fulfilled.

Sister leaned back from the hug. "Silva's waitin'."

"Then let's not tarry."

As they went forth to do battle against an old foe, Sister asked, reluctance to intrude riding high in her eyes, "Mogul said there'us a girl. Your girl."

"There was. She died."

"Silva's kilt her?"

"Hers were the hands that did the deed, yes."

"So, you gonna get her back for it?"

"No, vengeance is not justice."

"What's the difference?"

Astraea took a deep breath. "I did many bad things when I was young and foolish. Silva might have killed my daughter, but the one truly responsible, was me. I died that day, the me whose great greed and hubris led me to ruin and destroyed the one good thing in my life. I paid what I owed. Am still paying what I owe. Now I am here to make sure Silva does the same."

Silence reigned for a time. Astraea watched Sister's pensive face out of the corner of her eye. Then the girl ventured, "Do you think peoples can ever make up for the bad stuff they done, even if it's a lot?"

"That is my one hope, yes. If not, then why do we try?"

"Maybe, maybe you can, uh," Sister started with a sidelong glance at her, "tell me 'bout her? Your girl, I mean."

"Someday, perhaps." She held a hand over her heart. "When the pain eases a little."

"What if it don't?" Again, that insight. How it cut her to the quick.

"Then it will serve to remind me why I keep fighting."

* * *

They obtained a disguise of sorts for Astraea from a street vendor. A simple hooded cloak that kept prying eyes from sussing out her intention to infiltrate the Burrow.

She passed the security checkpoints after relinquishing her firearm. As she and Sister passed into the large bowl-shaped room full of spectators of every race, Astraea looked around, trying to spot Silva amid the throng. A caged hexagon lay in the center, at the bottom of the 'bowl'. While above, dark water covered the dome.

"Psst. Keep your head down. Silva's like to be in the box up there." Sister yanked the justicar's cowl lower with one fist, jerking a thumb upward with the other. Astraea pulled it back just enough to peer where that thumb pointed. She saw figures on a floating platform above and beyond the arena itself. Sister then said, "Gotta check in. Let me do the talkin'. If peoples asks, you're my new handler."

The girl led her to a high table, where she thumped her little fist on the top and pulled herself up to see over. "Chojo!"

A slender salarian spun at her voice. "Hey, squirt, long time no see."

"Got trainings. Done now. Come to fight."

Astraea saw Chojo's feet shuffle in her direction, but she kept her cowl low to hide her face. The salarian asked, "Where's Keigan?"

"Met a girl. Went rec-ree-ay-shun," Sister's voice took on an exasperating tone, indicating this happened a lot.

Chojo laughed. "Oh, I'll bet. I'll bet he's recreating all over."

"This's m'new handler, Nee-ko."

The justicar nodded. A disdainful snort answered her. She marked it well.

"Well, you're here, so I guess it doesn't much matter where that ass, Keigan, is. He owes me three-fifty. Make sure you tell him that." Chojo chuckled again and his tone turned conspiratorial, "You got some competition this time. The Primacy sanctioned this fight. You're going against some tough kids. Drell kids. Assassin trainees."

"Big deal. I got some new moves, m'self." Her bluster served to keep everyone's attention on her. "Boss Silva coming down for inspec-shun?"

"After the fight, kid. She's got a lot of Establishment up there to entertain."

"I'ma get gear. Where'zit at?"

The salarian pointed along the wall, where a pile of disassembled armors and melee weapons lay on a bench behind a couple turian bodyguards in Dire Corbie-purple. "Handlers stay in the hutch during the fight!" he called after them as they walked away.

Sister pulled her aside before they got there and pulled her down to speak in her ear. "Was hopin' she'd come down before the fight, but no luck."

"It is never easy." Astraea studied the platform without seeming to look at it directly. She smiled and assured her companion, "I will find a way to get to her."

"She'll be plenty distracted when it gets messy. Won't be watching her backside, most like."

"I agree. Are you going to be okay fighting like this?"

"Never knew anything but. Didn't know no better til you come along." Sister hugged her, brief and fierce. "Thank you."

"No, thank you, Sister. Be careful."

"You, too. Get her good. I don't want to be no slave again." With that, the girl scampered off to pick through the gear provided to the fighters.

Astraea found her way to the 'handler hutch', a smaller caged area where all the fighters' caretakers were kept and watched. The justicar found herself in their midst, many suspicious pairs of eyes glaring at her. She looked up and saw that the top lay open. From here, she could study the stadium at leisure. The floating platform drifted directly above. Tracing her gaze along the wall, she saw a series of support struts running up and along the dome. There lay an opportunity. She had to wait for the fighting to be in full swing, though, if she had any hope of getting up there unnoticed.

"You are the human girl's handler, correct?" came a smooth voice from her left.

"Temporarily, yes." Astraea turned to look at the speaker, a handsome drell with striking yellow and crimson markings. Muscles moved under his tight sleeveless tunic and trews and he moved with an easy coordination that boasted much martial prowess.

"I've studied recordings of her style. It's quite remarkable. Brutal, but effective." He put a hand out. Uncertain, she took it with her own. With solemn respect, he bowed over their joined hands. "I am Tytus. Moloch is my disciple in the Compact."

"Moloch?"

The drell smiled. "Moloch is your student's challenger. I think she will find him a worthy adversary. Fully capable and strong. I am interested to see how they both fare in their bout."

Taken aback by this reference of children fighting to the death as honorable battle, she snatched her hand back. Astraea turned her shoulder to him in contempt and concentrated on her task.

"I have made you angry. Tell me, what did I say wrong?"

Gritting her teeth, she narrowed her eyes at him. "You cannot tell me you do not see the wrongness here. Those are children, younglings and soon one or more of them will die on this altar of greed!" Aware that she'd gotten quite loud and drawn curious stares, she pulled her cowl lower over her eyes.

"Die?" Tytus looked around in vague confusion. "No, this is a tournament to first blood. So have I been informed."

"Then you have been sadly misinformed. Look around you. Do you honestly believe these 'good' people have come to see toddlers fall on their behinds and cry?" She gestured to take in the crowd of obvious rogues and malcontents.

Tytus hummed as he took in her point and saw the discrepancy. "Then why have so many of these handlers brought their charges, if it is to a bloodbath? Why would their charges agree to such a thing?"

"They have no choice. They are slaves!" Her finger poked him in the chest.

Now, alarmed, Tytus' mouth opened and closed. He managed after a long moment, "Slaves?"

"Yes, slaves."

"No, impossible. The Primacy would nev-"

"The _Primacy_ sanctioned these matches." Her eyes accused him of complicity.

To which he held up his hands and retorted with a touch of heat, "Then they did not know."

"How could they not? Is not your Compact a similar system?"

"It is. _N__ot._ Slavery." Vehement. Passionate, even. She decided to listen. Tytus swept a hand through the air between them. "We serve through choice. Our children serve in gratitude to the hanar for saving what few of us they could and thereby bring honor to their families. If they so chose, they could leave the Compact. It would sadden their patron, but no repercussions would be visited on the child for it. Even as a pledged assassin, I choose whether or not I accept a contract. _My_ choice to be a knife in another's hand."

"You take money for murder," she prodded, trying to find the shape of his reasoning.

"Only to maintain myself and those for whom I'm responsible. Much like a whetstone keeps a blade sharp, I must eat. And have shelter." A solid case. One that swayed the justicar. It was a question of basic economics and ultimate responsibility. When a person hired a killer to assassinate someone else, who was at fault? The assassin? Or the one who hired his services? The intent to murder must lay with the employer.

Tytus looked around at the crowd, cheering for the fighters who must have made their appearance. "If what you say is true, we must stop this. The Primacy wouldn't countenance this travesty if they truly understood what it entailed. It must be a misunderstanding."

"I hope you are right. I only came to kill a few, but if these others are culpable, then I'll have no choice but to slay them as well." Tytus turned to ask her what she meant, but the crowd drowned out his words.

Astraea turned to see the first combatants take the stage. Two vorcha adolescents flew at each other in a flash of long, clawed arms. Blood soon flew into the crowd. They roared their approval, laughing and cajoling the youngsters killing each other out there. Disgust made her gorge rise. She swung on a horror-stricken Tytus. "Are you serious about stopping this? For this is just the beginning. Silva is gearing up for massive distribution of gladiators all across the galaxy. By this time next year, there will be a pit like this on every world populated enough to have a spaceport. The blood of slaves will soak their floors and grease the wheels of avarice."

Tytus cringed away from the spectacle and rasped, "Whatever you need me to do, I will do it."

"Cover me as I climb up to that platform and end this tragedy." She didn't even look back to see if he'd heard. Flinging off her cloak, Astraea swung herself up the cage walls. The supports proved easy enough to climb.

Behind her she heard another handler start to say, "Hey, what are you do-ghck!"

Tytus, true to his word, silenced that voice, hid his deed in the roar of the crowd. She spared a silent thanks to him with a look. The drell looked up at her and gave a salute.

In the ring, menials cleared away what was left of those two vorcha boys. The crowd went wild as the next set stepped up. Sister and another human child faced off. Bets rang out over the tumult. Astraea paused as her ward burst into action, spinning and punching, the spiked gauntlets on her hands gouging the other's flesh. Clearly outmatched, the boy could only backpedal, until he broke and ran for the fence, climbing it like a primate. Sister pursued, actually beating him to the top and straddling it. Then she grabbed him by his loincloth and heaved him the rest of the way over, down into the spectators. When the boy stood once more, woozy and beaten, Sister threw her arms up in victory, giving an ululating shout.

Amused by this turn, the mob howled their laughter. Sister jumped down in a fancy double spin and landed nimbly on her feet. She jeered her retreating opponent with thumb to nose.

Astraea shook her head at the girl's antics. Other fighters took the field as the justicar kept climbing. The dome, wide and tall, daunted her with the idea that it might take forever to get to the part over the platform. She hardened her resolve and concentrated on putting one hand over the other, one foot higher with each step.

Sometime later, she heard more roaring and looked down to see a slim blue and green figure slide into the ring with Sister. That must be Moloch, the contender. The justicar prayed to the Goddess to grant Sister fortitude, for if the student were anything like the master, he presented quite the challenge indeed. Sister seemed to know the time for silliness had passed as well, for her whole bearing changed to reflect seriousness. In a blur, the two children lunged at each other, hands and feet flying in deadly arcs.

Even without the showmanship, Astraea found it difficult to pull her eyes away from that spectacle. Had any thirty year-old asari ever shown such mastery of self?

Higher and higher she climbed, until she could just see over the platform. Silva leaned over the far side, yelling and laughing encouragement to those who strove to not die below. One of which had become quite precious to Astraea.

The hanar that swayed at Silva's side undulated in distress, their bio-luminescence flashing alarming shades of maroon and chartreuse, visible even to Astraea's un-augmented eyes. She could just hear their protestation. "This one did not expect such unseemly behavior. Or that the match would go past a Blooding."

"Oh, grow a spine, will you?" cajoled Silva, then she winked at the speaker. "No offense."

"This one will not be liable for any death-grudges this mockery of our traditions will engender-"

"No one's going to retaliate. Look at them all. They're loving it. And they'll love me for bringing it to them! And I'll love the credits they spend just to get in the door." She cheered as Sister executed a particularly difficult riposte. Nudging the hanar with an elbow, she snarked, "Don't forget that a cut of the proceeds is yours. Plus a little extra for keeping the cops away."

"Money is not equivalent to honor-"

"Let's talk about it after, 'kay? When we're splitting the take. You're ruining the mood."

Looming now, above the gathering on the platform, Astraea let her upper body dangle as she thought of the best method of approach. The hanar would be no problem, but the other 'honored' guests could be. Two turians, a salarian and of course, Silva. Quick, decisive. That had to be the way.

Picking her target, Astraea plummeted, flipping mid-air to land on the platform. She dropped a singularity on the turians. The salarian froze in her stasis. Silva turned with a curse and shouted to the hanar, "Get her!"

The hanar looked at one another and their spokesman said, "This one believes you mad."

"Fucking jellyfish!" snarled Silva.

The justicar stalked her target, omniblade at the ready. With casual disregard, she shoved the salarian off the platform and slashed the two turians' throats just as the singularity dissipated. "Silva N'ordain, the Code demands you answer for your crimes."

Silva pulled out a firearm, so small that the justicar hadn't noticed it. The mercenary-turned-slaver laughed. "You didn't think I'd ever go unarmed, did you? I'm not stupid."

"No one could ever say that of you. You, who used to stay up nights studying the specs so none of us on the job were caught unaware. You, who made sure we had extra clips and didn't we always end up needing them? You, who shared the passion for my endeavor as well as my bed." Astraea paced back and forth before the pistol's swinging muzzle. "Where did that careful, yet caring comrade go? Where did this hateful and cruel being come from? How did the father of my Cassia turn into a monster?"

Silva's mouth gaped in shock and that gun trembled as it pointed at her. Then the mercenary's eyes went flat and steely and Astraea knew then Silva had gone past the point of recalling, of even caring that she'd murdered her own daughter. "As if you were always such a bleeding heart! Hypocrite. You were right beside me the whole time. We slaughtered hundreds of people, kids included, stole millions of credits. We had the galaxy in the palms of our hands! And you threw it away!"

"For my child, yes. A hundred times, yes. The funny thing is, I'd made arrangements to give it all to you anyway," she said, with a rueful smile.

"Like that fixes anything! Look at you now. A justicar. How can _you _stand there now and judge me?" Silva set her jaw and grimaced in hate. "The blood on my hands is _a shallow pond_ compared to the oceans that stain yours!"

Silva opened fire. The rounds sped at the justicar, who leapt sideways to evade them. A couple ricocheted off her shields, throwing her balance off-center. She nearly toppled to her doom off the edge. A stray bullet found its way into the controls. Silva cursed a long string of curses as the floating platform started to tip.

The mob below cried out in horror as it began to fall. They scrambled for the exits. Some, too unfortunate to escape, got crushed under its bulk as it slammed into the stadium floor. Thrown from her feet, Astraea slid with the impact, praying that the thing did not flip completely over. The structure ground to a halt. The justicar stood on shaky legs and looked around for her target.

Who crawled away from her, a long strut piercing her through the middle. Blood trickled from her lips to the canvas of the pit floor. The platform had flattened one whole side of the hexagon in its descent.

Fear struck the justicar then and she looked around for Sister, wildly, spinning a complete 180 degrees looking for her. A pained cry behind her made her spin back.

Sister straddled Silva above the metal rod, pinning her to the mat, one small hand gloved in spikes around the woman's throat. Silva struggled and rasped, "Kill her! Kill the justicar!"

The girl batted the mercenary's weak and flailing arms away. "Stop. You're embarrassin' y'self. All this time teachin' me to kill and you never thought once how easy it could be for me to snuff you?"

By the fear in the woman's eyes, she had not thought about it. Until now. Still, she fought back. With words. "I fed you. I trained you. I gave you everything!"

Sister leaned in close and shouted, "_You took it all away! Stole _it. Hollowed me out. And what you left ain't worth shit. I got nothing but a hunger for killin'."

"Hgk-" Silva tried to speak around the constricting hand at her throat, but Sister's other fist swept up to grasp the slaver's neck as well.

"No. Shut up. You filled me with, with _wrong._ Made me proud of it. And I didn't know. I's . . . _ignorance_ until _she _showed me t'other side of it all. The good, the right. There's worlds of good to go along with the bad. But you-

"There ain't _nothin'_ right about you. It's just all . . . wrong. Like when you had Mogul snuff my mama just 'cuz you thought a little mothering made me soft. Like she hadn't been beat down enough bein' body-slave to your mercs!" The girl slapped Silva across the mouth, her spikes throwing purple droplets off to one side. Into Silva's disbelieving eyes, Sister uttered in deadly soft tones, "Yeah, I knew. I always knew."

Astraea, frozen at this heartbreaking revelation, started forward. "Sister-"

"Hear that? I got something now. A name. It's mine forever. It ain't much, but it's a start." The little girl turned her golden eyes shimmering with tears to Astraea, asking her-no, begging her for permission to end it.

The justicar warred with herself as she agonized over this decision. Part of her still held onto the belief that this child could still be saved, could still reclaim a portion of her innocence. But the Code knew better. That door was closed, for all eternity. She nodded and closed her eyes, unable to watch as Sister choked Silva to death.

With a last wretched gurgle, Silva sighed out her last breath. A light cough to the side made her turn and regard Tytus, who stood some ways off with his charge, Moloch, before him. She could see from the way his hands rested on the boy's shoulders that the man really and truly cared for his student. "I alerted the authorities. They should be on their way."

"Thank you, Tytus. And thank you for your help."

To Moloch, he said, "You fought well, kit. A little more ferocity and you would have had her."

The boy groaned in good-natured dismay and let the man lead him away. The pair bantered back and forth as they left. That lightened her heavy heart and made her turn back to Sister.

The girl, standing over Silva, seemed lost. It pulled Astraea to her side and on impulse, the justicar reached down for her small hand. Sister squeezed it and said, "Think I know what vengeance means now."

"Hm?" said Astraea, with care, for she did not know how tenuous or fragile the girl's spirit might be.

"I enjoyed that. 'Cuz it fed somethin' in me. A, a need. But that's wrong, too. It don't feel good. After." Sister looked up at the justicar, worry and fear in her face. "Did I break the Code? Am I unjust?"

"Vengeance, though ugly, is allowed to those who haven't forsworn it. You have taken no more than what was owed."

"I'm ugly?" Resignation filled the girl's tone.

Astraea chuckled. "We're all a little ugly on the inside, dear heart. It's up to us to want more. To have hope for change."

"I want it." So firm and full of conviction was Sister that Astraea had to smile. Sister held up her arms and, indulging her, the justicar picked her up and put her to a hip.

"I thought you were seven. Isn't that a little old to want to be carried?" Astraea strode to the Burrow's exit, eager to be away from this place.

"Yeah, maybe, but I looks five and aren't I small 'nuff?" The girl giggled in her aural canals, then asked, "Where we going now?"

"Home."

"Where's that?"

"Thessia, the asari homeworld."

"What's a homeworld?"

"It's where a species originates. Have you ever been to Earth, your homeworld?"

"Newp. Don't rightly think I can call it home if'n I never been there." Sister's face turned solemn in her periphery. "Think maybe I can make Thessia home?"

"I was just thinking something like that. But we'll see."


	4. Chapter 4

**Epilogue:**

"They will not accept her."

Astraea smiled a rueful smile before replying, "And greetings to you, as well, _Didaskala."_

The asari who'd mentored her in the ways of the Code stood by, leaning on a column. She sighed and repeated herself, "They will not accept her."

"Was it not you who told me that justicars are not chosen, they choose?" They both turned to watch a slim figure dance through martial forms as old as asari history. Astraea felt pleased to note that Sister had finally mastered the sixth form, and in only four years, too. Quite the achievement, considering others of her 'peer group,' older asari who joined the order at the same time as she, still struggled with the fourth. "That they either are or are not justicars?"

"As true now as when I said it." Her peer flashed wonder at a particularly tricky standing leap. "She is no biotic."

Astraea felt a lack of surprise that her mentor would bring that up, being a powerhouse of biotic force. "There are some of us for whom the talents are weak. It does not hinder us, or our pursuit of justice."

"She will be old and die before she can possibly learn all the Sutras. Or the forms."

"A life spent in the study of justice is not a wasted life." She smiled as she then continued, "Do you lament her not being asari? Justice does not just belong to only us. We do not own it. Nor does age automatically grant wisdom."

"She burns too hot, like all the shorter-lived races. Her judgments will be rushed and ill-considered."

Astraea put aside the urge to correct her peer on Sister's behalf. For she often had to push the girl into making any decision at all. Sister kept claiming the lack of information and perspective. Too many variables, she'd cry, much to Astraea's exasperation. She rumbled a chuckle. "Funny. That's what she says about us."

"Explain."

"Sister believes that we leave large holes in the fabric of the galactic community. That a judgment isn't only just or unjust, but a combination of both, on a sliding scale of repercussions in the near and far future."

Her mentor froze and contemplated for a long while the girl out there on the sand. Astraea let her ponder, while she waited for the expected comment, which came forthwith. "That is a deep understanding of the Code that I did not expect her to have realized this early."

"She does not know of the work we do after judgment. The rebuilding of colonies that have had their corrupted leadership routed. Or the charities given to orphans and widows. The many ways we restore balance after destroying it. She came to this truth on her own, without my help."

Astraea could see the argument breaking down in her peer's eyes, but ever unwilling to budge, her fellow justicar said, as a last ditch effort, "But she is so young! Those who find us have lived centuries steeped in sin."

"She has seen more wrong and injustice than many and burns with the need to right it. She has killed since she's been able to hold a weapon. Who are we to deny her this path when she so clearly needs it? And fits so well within it?" Astraea smiled in empathy and understanding of her friend's distress. "We fear change and difference. We see a threat in those who carry the flame of youth merely because we think they will burn themselves or us with it. Must we mother the universe? Do we not have enough to do just fixing that which has gone wrong?

"Time will tell if I am mistaken, but I believe, I _have_ to believe, that past this apocalypse on the horizon, a future rife with hope exists."

Taken aback by Astraea's tirade, her mentor blinked her pale blue eyes and said, "The student becomes the teacher."

"That's as it should be. I wonder what more I shall learn from her, in the fullness of time." Sister waved to her from the training grounds, a merry smile on her face. Astraea waved back.

"There's a gathering. The Assembly meets this afternoon."

"We're moving against the Reapers?"

"Yes. Unlike the Republic's leaders, justicars know truth when we hear it. I come to bring my findings to share." Her mentor's gaze turned inward. "I have seen things, Astraea. Horrors."

"Then it is good we gather. Dark times need strong defenders."

Her fellow justicar agreed with a hum, then said, "Bring your protege. I stand with you."

"Thank you, Samara. That means a lot to me." As Astraea watched her ruby-clad friend walk away, she mused over what would come of that afternoon's meeting of all the justicars living today. So many in one place. Not as many as once were,_ but might be again,_ she thought as her gaze drew back to Sister smiting imaginary foes with lethal skill.

Astraea snapped her fingers, loud and carrying. Sister stopped her training and trotted over to kneel at her side. "Yes, _Didaskala?"_

Such a warmth filled her. "Go into town and procure us some formal leathers."

"What color?" Sister knew Astraea favored white. Her twinkling golden eyes asked another question entirely.

"Whatever color that strikes your fancy. We're going to Assembly in three chimes of the hour."

Later, as she strode along the ancient congress of martyrs, the sight of all her sisters in one place stole her breath. Strong and grim, they stood in all their glory and she was fortunate enough to be counted among their number.

_An annihilation of justicars,_ she thought with thunderous joy. She shot a wink at Sister, who gaped in awe at the august Assembly. _Well, an annihilation . . . plus one._

* * *

**_A/N: Well, that's my story and I'm sticking to it. lol. I hope you enjoyed it and if you feel the urge, gimme some feedback. We poor authors starve if no one gives us our cheese. All props to Aria's Afterlife Forum for giving us such wonderful competitions to stretch our creative muscles for._**


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